Sunday, March 3, 2013

Heiankyo Alien R (Gameboy Advance)

My first fake Gameboy Advance cartridge!

Believe it or not, Heiankyo Alien
used to be kind of a big deal in the video game world. Developed for
Japanese computers in 1979 by The University of Tokyo's Theoretical
Science Group, a year later it was released in arcades by Denki Onkyo
and ruthlessly ripped off by several other game makers (read more on the wikipedia page). You
play a police officer defending the city of Heian-kyo (peace and
tranquility capital, a former name for Kyoto) from an inexplicable alien
invasion by running along the streets digging holes and trapping the
monsters Dig-Dug style.

Nice
graphics, right? This simple concept was often cloned and imitated, but
you don't really see this type of gameplay anymore, do you? I don't
keep up on mobile games but there's a chance someone has revisited the
style. In any case, I don't have a great deal to say about Heiankyo
Alien but I like it and the world has gone too long without a sequel.
Here's Heiankyo Alien R (REBIRTH)!

I
wanted to keep it simple to reference the bizarre style of the Game Boy
port (by Meldac, most infamous for Zombie Nation) while making it look a
bit more up to date.

More Heiankyo Alien chat and pictures behind the link.

I
like how it turned out. If you can make out the texture in the red
background, that's an illustration I was originally going to use, but
decided on cleaner silhouettes. Japanese labels in general go easier on
all the logos and extra information than US labels, which is nice.
Here's a crappy looking comparison of the two versions:

Here's
a pointless story--I found the Game Boy port not long ago in a plastic
container at a Houston used game store, and they told me they couldn't
find it in their store database so they gave it to me for a dollar. I
was hoping I had hit the jackpot because I hadn't even known Heiankyo
Alien had been released in the West, but it only goes for a few bucks on
eBay anyway. OH WELL!

1 comment:

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